Alone in the woods they found glades that might have been cleared explicitly for the purpose of jousting and caves ideal for the imprisonment of princesses. They even uncovered a fountain, dried up and battered but a fountain nevertheless, of the sort likely to be encountered by any paladin galloping over the countryside or any princess escaping the clutches of a villainous Saracen. It was as if nature herself had created the ideal setting for Isabella’s tragedy.
How could such things have happened under the watchful eyes of the nurses and teachers and lalas of the Harem School? Perhaps because it came about innocently. Princess Saida and the foreign boy were so young. Both were thought to be children, much too young to present any threat to each other. And the boy was mastering the Turkish language at a formidable rate. Soon he would move on to a European school of his father’s choosing. And the princess would, of course, marry.
Was it the certainty that, in the very near future, these children would be leaving their childhood behind them that blinded the adults to what was happening between them in the here and now? Whatever the case, their ferocious chases on horseback, their muttered little exchanges as they shot off their arrows during archery practice, and their occasional absences from their fellow students went unremarked, and they remained free to play the game they had invented.
Then, as unexpectedly as it had begun, the little idyll came to an end. With the threat of puberty looming, the time arrived for the children of the Harem School to put away childish things and move into adulthood: the boys to enter one of the all-male pages’ schools, the girls to be immersed deep in the harem to prepare for marriage.
Oddly enough, the event that ushered in this sudden change was marked by a seemingly unrelated ceremonial occasion: the circumcision of three of Suleiman’s sons. And Danilo’s first intimation of what lay ahead arrived in the unlikely form of an invitation from Prince Mehmet, the Sultan’s first son by his Second Kadin, to take a walk in his mother’s garden.
Since the prince was younger — just the age at which Danilo himself had come into the Princes School — contact between the two boys had been limited to nods and smiles. So Danilo was puzzled by the sudden offer of a princely arm. What could this boy want of him? He quickly found out. As soon as they were out of earshot of the other students, Mehmet dropped his formal manner and got straight to the point.
“I know that you were circumcised because all Jews are cut,” he began. “Tell me, please, did it hurt?”
What was Prince Mehmet after? Whatever it was, Danilo had nothing to lose by telling the truth. “I can’t remember,” he replied with perfect candor. Then, his curiosity piqued, he asked, “Why do you want to know?”
“Because we’ve been told that two of my brothers and I are going to be circumcised on the twenty-third day of June, and I have to know how much it hurts in order to prepare myself. They say it hurts like burning hell. Does it?” And, when Danilo did not immediately answer, the young prince added, “They say you never forget the pain.”
“I can’t remember.” Danilo was beginning to feel himself inadequate to conduct this bizarre conversation. “You see, I was only seven days old when I was circumcised. That’s when we Jews do it.”
“Damn!” The boy slapped his hand against his thigh. “No one told me that. And now you think me a fool.”
“Of course I don’t, Mehmet. You can’t be expected to know everybody else’s customs.”
“I’ll bet you do,” the boy answered. “Everyone knows how clever the Jews are. I learned that from my great-grandfather, Bayezid. Do you know what he said when he heard that the Catholic king of Spain had expelled the Jews from his country?”
Danilo shook his head.
“My great-grandfather said, ‘People tell me that Ferdinand of Spain is a wise king. I ask, how wise can he be? A king who impoverishes his country by expelling the Jews and enriches the Ottoman Empire by sending them to us must be stupid.’”
“Your great-grandfather said that?”
“In 1492,” the boy assured him confidently. “Even then, we Ottomans knew that the Jews are the most clever of all races. My father told me that story. He also told me that the Jews are skilled craftsmen, astute merchants, and brilliant doctors. That is why we have always welcomed them into the Ottoman Empire. Did not your father, the physician, cure my father of his gout when all the Arab doctors failed?” Then, without waiting for a confirmation, he added, “And now I see for myself an example. How clever of you to do it to babies.”
“Clever? Babies?” Danilo was having difficulty making the leap.
“Because babies don’t feel anything. We Muslims leave it until so late that we always remember the pain. But that is not why I am afraid.” He stopped abruptly.
“Why then?”
The boy looked down at his boots, silent, then peered up through the fringe of shiny black hair on his forehead, bit his lip, and looked Danilo straight in the eye, having decided, it seemed, to give up a secret.
“I am afraid that I will disgrace myself by crying out,” he whispered. “The pain will pass, but the shame will never go away. People always remember that you cried out at your circumcision.” He paused, then almost as if speaking to himself, asked, “But what if you can’t stop yourself?”
The question was accompanied by a look so woebegone that Danilo found himself wrapping his arm affectionately around the younger boy’s shoulder. “You have nothing to worry about, Mehmet. You are a brave boy just like your namesake, Mehmet the Conqueror. Everybody says you resemble him.”
“They do?” The boy remained solemn but looked slightly less woeful. “We must learn to be brave, my brothers and I, because there is nothing ahead for us but certain death.”
Danilo was well aware of the Ottoman practice of eliminating all fraternal rivals to the throne each time a new sultan was crowned. But he had stored it in his memory as an ancient custom, not something that really happened to the real princes he knew. Now, suddenly, he found himself looking into its human face.
“But there were no executions when your father, Suleiman, came to the throne,” he temporized.
“Only because he had no living brothers. But my mother tells us that, on the day that my half-brother, Mustafa, comes to the throne, he will exile her and have us all killed.”
“Oh, surely Mustafa wouldn’t do a thing like that,” said Danilo, knowing as he spoke how foolish he sounded.
“It was my ancestor, Bayezid, who authored this law,” the boy explained. “He did it to preserve the succession. Do you wish to hear his exact words?”
At Danilo’s nod of assent the boy began to recite his forefather’s dictum. “It is proper for whichever of my sons is favored by God with the sultanate to move immediately to execute his brothers in order to prevent the outbreak of a civil war.” Then, striking a pose, the little prince continued, “What is the death of a prince compared to the loss of a province?”
After delivering the rhetorical flourish, the prince went on in the same composed tone he had adopted at the beginning of the conversation. “That is why my brothers and I must die. But since it is against the law to shed the blood of princes, we will not be beheaded. Each one of us will be strangled with a silken bow string.”
The bizarre logic behind this final bit of protocol only exacerbated Danilo’s dismay. He tightened his hold on the boy’s shoulder as if to shield him from his fate. Then, realizing he must offer some kind of verbal consolation, he said, “I don’t think the pain of the circumcision is as bad as they say and I know you will not cry out, Mehmet. I am certain of it.”
The reassurance sounded hollow in his ears. But, sure enough, on the day of the circumcision ceremony, everyone commented favorably on the extraordinary forbearance of Prince Mehmet, who did not make a single sound when the knife cut his foreskin.
4
HALCYON DAYS
The festival of the
royal circumcisions so dreaded by young Mehmet turned out to be a fateful occasion for Danilo as well. In the week after the circumcisions, the Kapi Agasi made one of his rare appearances in the little school on the edge of the harem garden to announce the news. Now that the present cohort of boys had passed the bar of circumcision, it was time to make way for the next class in the Princes School. The crown prince, Mustafa, would be sent directly to an outlying province as an apprentice governor, accompanied by his mother and a covey of lalas. The lesser princes, raised from infancy by their mothers in the harem, would now be assigned places in one of the Sultan’s elite schools for pages, there to be groomed for leadership in an all-male society by eunuchs.
For the boys’ sisters and female cousins, little would change. The girls would continue to be educated in the harem, never again to be seen unveiled even by their male cousins. No more calcio, no more racing on horseback. Once a young girl entered the state of womanhood, she was immured behind the walls of her father’s harem until she married into her mother-in-law’s harem. From the day Saida’s fellow students entered the class, the Valide Sultan, ever watchful for her granddaughter’s well-being, began to notice subtle changes in the girl. It seemed that day by day, the fire that put the sparkle in Saida’s flashing eyes and the color in her cheeks was being slowly doused by her new routine.
The princess was of course still permitted her daily ride, but now she rode alone accompanied at a respectful distance by a groom — no brothers or cousins to challenge her at the jumps or chase her around the race course. Yet she was still far too young, in the Valide’s judgment, to be married off.
Educating boys and girls together until puberty, as the Greeks did, had appeared to be a hugely successful experiment in producing future Ottoman leaders. But seeing a free and educated girl suddenly thrust into a life with no future until she was rescued by marriage now loomed as a serious challenge to her doting guardian.
A pious woman, Lady Hafsa visited the mosque to enlist Allah’s help in solving her dilemma. Two days later — whether by divine intervention or sheer chance — the help she needed presented itself in the form of the Sultan’s concubine, Hürrem, who had begun her life at court as a gift from the Grand Vizier to the Sultan, purchased by him at the Istanbul slave market. She now had risen to the status of Second Kadin, a Mother of Princes, by providing the Sultan with a son. The First Kadin, Rose of Spring, mother of the Sultan’s first-born male, Prince Mustafa, had failed to produce a second male heir to guarantee the succession. Given the high rate of child mortality, Hürrem’s boy was wildly celebrated as a savior of the Ottoman dynasty and earned her the title of Second Kadin.
So when Hürrem appeared at the Valide’s door tearful and in need of solace in the days following the circumcision of her older son, the concubine was greeted warmly by Lady Hafsa. This was not the first time the Second Kadin had sought counsel from the Valide. Soon after the birth of her son Mehmet, she had begun to cultivate the boy’s grandmother. Never aggressively, always respectful of protocol, always careful to request an appointment before she crossed the long hallway that divided the Valide Sultan’s suite from the rest of the harem. And always bearing gifts — a special cream to whiten the aging skin, a sleeping draught to bring sweet dreams to the Valide’s sleepless nights. Full of news of the great world, Hürrem was sure to bring along gossip collected from the Jewish peddler women from whom she bought her laces and ribbons and lotions and potions.
At first Saida resented the interloper. Since childhood, her grandmother’s attention had been fixed on her. Now she had to share it. But as time went on, she began to look forward to Hürrem’s visits. She even began to ask Hürrem to beg small favors for her from her father, the Sultan. Not that she was afraid of him. But, as Hürrem so often reminded the Lady Hafsa and Saida, bearing the weight of the world on his shoulders, the beloved Sultan ought not to be burdened with their small concerns, least of all by the ones who loved him most.
“Allow me to see what I can do,” Hürrem would say, “before we trouble the great Padishah. Poor man, he carries such a heavy weight.” Their duty, after all, was to lighten his load, he being the source of light in their lives and in the whole world. Even the Valide Sultan, the mother he revered, bowed and kissed his hand when he entered her rooms. And she addressed him as “my lion.”
Their mutual adoration of this man had bound the three women together. Over time, Saida lost most of the jealousy she bore her father’s favorite Kadin; and the Valide Sultan gave up some of her pride of place. Lady Hürrem had managed to smile her way into their hearts, a very shrewd preparation for the day when she might need the help of one or both of them.
Today being such a day, Hürrem was now familiar enough to make a direct appeal to the Valide Sultan. Ever respectful of protocol, she first apologized profusely for disturbing the lady and made certain to assure the Valide that what she was seeking was simply the advice of a wise woman. Then she got to the point: a rumor she had picked up while bathing in the hamam. Only a whiff of scandal. Nevertheless, most disturbing. By now, she had their undivided attention.
“I have heard a story.” She leaned forward and lowered her voice to a whisper. “Perhaps it is not true. But if it is . . .”
The Valide, a woman not given to touching any being less exalted than herself, reached out to pat the other woman on the shoulder.
“What is this rumor, Hürrem?” she asked gently.
Silence. A sigh.
“We cannot help you if you do not tell us.”
“Oh, Lady, I am so ashamed. I fear it is all my fault for being so slow to learn. Although I do try . . .”
“To learn?”
“To learn my letters so that I can write to my exalted lord in my own hand and read the letters he sends to me. As it is, I must trust the scribe who writes my words down and who reads the Padishah’s letters to me. I cannot believe this scribe would betray me, and yet there is this rumor . . .” She dabbed at her eyes with a gold-embroidered handkerchief. “I am told that my letters are being hawked in the bazaar.”
“Sold? For money?” Even the imperturbable Valide was perturbed.
“Copies of them.”
“But who would do such a thing?”
“Who indeed?” Hürrem echoed. “My scribe came to me from the Grand Vizier’s school. He was handpicked. It cannot be him. But if not . . .” Her voice trailed off. Then, suddenly, she turned and focused her gaze directly on Saida. “Is there no one I can trust?”
At that moment the solution to all of Hürrem’s problems became clear to the Valide.
“Saida will help you,” she announced, pleased with herself, turning to the girl. “Did I not tell you that your studies would find good use someday, my darling child?” Then, back to Hürrem, “Some members of the court were against training a girl in anything except embroidery and sherbet-making. But I prevailed on my son, my lion, to allow Saida to join her brothers in their studies. To her credit, she is today the most literate princess in the world and has memorized most of the Koran, which brings her father great joy. Now she is able to do him another service, to save him from the breath of scandal. As you know, she often helps me to write my letters, and now she will help you.”
So it was settled. Henceforth Saida would pay a daily visit to Hürrem’s quarters to read aloud the letters the Sultan wrote to her when he was on campaign and to transcribe Hürrem’s answers. She would also translate the poems the Sultan dedicated to his Second Kadin, written under the pseudonym Muhabbi or He Who Loves, which he composed in Persian — his choice of language for poetizing. A happy arrangement for all. A scandal avoided. The beloved Padishah protected; Hürrem rescued. The wise grandmother had saved the day.
Yet several months later Saida was beginning to sense something too easy in the Valide’s solution. A practiced survivor by the age of twelve, the princess had cultivated a nose for intrigue. Experience in the harem
had taught her that life did not unfold with the ease of her entree into Hürrem’s household service unless someone behind the scenes was pulling the strings. Yet months of daily attendance had revealed to Saida no hidden reason for her inclusion in Hürrem’s retinue, except the Second Kadin’s immediate need for a trustworthy secretary. Nothing more.
When the princess arrived at Hürrem’s suite, she was always greeted warmly and respectfully. Her accomplishments were highly praised. And she was thanked often and promised rewards for service in the future. Saida, the Second Kadin said, had saved her from a very serious threat to the happiness she shared with her adored Padishah, whom she treasured more than her own life. As the lady put it, “His letters keep me alive. Without the reminder that he will return to me, I would expire of grief.”
Through her letters as well as her conversation, Saida had come to know Hürrem as a natural hyperbolizer — guilty of the odd lapse of taste, perhaps, but that was hardly proof of insincerity, the girl told herself. Besides, there were certain advantages to the princess’s new status as a confidante of the favorite: the opportunities to witness momentous events such as her father’s triumphal procession when he returned from his annual campaign. Outings through the streets that the cloistered women of the harem were never offered. And Hürrem’s constant assurance that the orphan girl now not only had a grandmother to look out for her, but had found a second mother — herself, the Second Kadin. At least, Saida thought, until Hürrem’s own daughter, Mihrimah, is old enough to do for her what I now do.
But Saida had schooled herself to accept each day’s bounty without too much thought for what the future might bring. Even if it was not her nature, her faith told her that her fate lay in Allah’s hands. And much as she longed for the old days of wild horse rides and secret meetings on the island of Kinali, she was resigned to making the best of her new life.
As for the boys, Danilo was not the only one in the room to feel a chill when the Kapi informed the students that this would be their final class in the Harem School. Like him, most of the students had not, until that moment, given much thought to their future. Some day, of course, they would grow up and leave the harem. Some day. But tomorrow? Danilo turned for reassurance as he often did to his seat mate, Princess Saida. But in vain. For the first time he was met with hooded lids and a turning away of the head.
The Legacy of Grazia dei Rossi Page 4